


La Danse Finale

by Experi



Category: Fate/Grand Order, Fate/stay night & Related Fandoms
Genre: Fairy Tale Elements, M/M, Slow Burn, lads its a Gothic Romance AU, the devils ball chapter of master and margarita but it's gay
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-11-22
Updated: 2020-12-08
Packaged: 2021-03-10 01:33:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 10,522
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27665476
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Experi/pseuds/Experi
Summary: Salieri faces the apex of an extremely bad month when a supernatural storm burns down the house he’s staying in and he’s picked up from the wreckage impulsively by the lead of a Wild Hunt. He’s promised the following: play the violin for a ritual gathering, and in exchange he’ll be owed a wish that could maybe even fix the mess his life has been left in.
Relationships: Hessian Lobo | Avenger/Antonio Salieri | Avenger
Comments: 5
Kudos: 15





	1. sturm und drang

**Author's Note:**

> my only hope is i manage to finish this ive literally never completed something over 20k and i havent done a longfic in years. lets go lads
> 
> uuuuhh doing third person omniscient is difficult for me but im trying it

The Wild Hunt brings disaster in its wake. There are different aspects of the Hunt; those made of storms, of carnivores, of flame, but all travel inside of disaster and surrounded by it. The howling of beasts mixing with the sound of cracking tree-trunks and rushing wind.

The Wild Hunt overtakes a small town. It’s not intentional. There was nothing this gathering of buildings and humans did in particular to incur any sort of wrath or attention from the universe as a whole. It simply happened to be in the path when a pack wished to run. Lightning crackles on the Hunt’s heels. It runs in the form of disaster. 

Hounds bark a noise like fire crackling. They’re a storm and a caught fire all in one when their footsteps slip inadvertently into the proper plane of humanity. Left behind the vanguard are flames and the simple joy of running.

Joy for the Hunt, at least, and the humans caught in a stray spark are not their concern. A town whose name doesn’t matter to the wolves and ghosts burning in a strange natural disaster is a stray casualty, minor side effect.

The vanguard brays a delighted advance warning as they trip back out of humanity’s world. 

The people stuck in the storm’s pawprints are less delighted.

A house catches fire from a stray bolt of lighting that grew where a Hunter stepped.Then another, another. Most of the people who lived in this house are out of it. One isn’t. 

Antonio Salieri swears an endless stream of muttered words he’s not paying attention to, as he wrenches a burning piece of wood away from a cabinet. “Shit. It’s not disappearing. I’m not losing this, too. A bit more. A bit more, shit--.”

He can dull his awareness of the pain as fire flickers over his shirt-sleeves and catches. It’s not important. It’s not important. He still needs-- hands close around the handle of a violin case and he pulls it free. Just in time, too, as the cabinet it was in rapidly begins to collapse in on itself with a shower of sparks. Salieri leaps backwards, coughing out surprise with his forearm thrown up over his face.

It’s fine. The case is intact. The violin should be fine. Salieri’s eyes burn and he swallows down a cough. It doesn’t matter, so long as he still has this -- he smacks at the case to brugh off any embers before he starts trying to address the slow smolder on the cuffs of his sleeves. It hurts, it  _ really _ hurts, but he doesn’t have time for pain. He’s got Amadeus’s violin, and now. Ah. The roof creaks ominously. Now he needs to get the hell out of here.

Salieri clutches the case to his chest and turns back to the door. A cough bubbles up - this time he can’t swallow it back down and doubles over, hacking. The sting in his throat doesn’t subside at all by the time he manages to get a decent breath down. It gets worse. But he can’t stay here. Nope. Shit. Flame crackles around his periphery and bites at his feet.

Another spat of cursing as Salieri ducks down, violin case held protectively, and sprints for the staircase. He can hear the sound of something falling, but he doesn’t have  _ time _ for that. This whole building went up too quickly, this can’t be right, but -- Salieri yelps as he misses a step on the wooden staircase and loses his balance, falling too hard on the next step and sending his foot directly through the charred wood.

Pain stabs through him. He grits his teeth and tugs himself free. There’s blood seeping into his sock, which stands out as strangely more noticeable than the pain. He can’t get his balance right again, he needs someone to come haul him up.

But no one’s coming for him. No one’s going to help him. So he either leaves or he dies. Fine then. Salieri staggers off, tripping over himself. His lungs are burning, his arms hurt, putting any weight on his foot sends a shock of pain up his leg, but. He still has the violin. And the door’s right there.

Thunder cracks overhead. The offer of proper rain is too little, too late, as it blends with the sound of the house frame giving out around Salieri. It’s dizzying. Something falls. It’s not Salieri. That’s all he can manage to pay attention to, that it’s not  _ him _ falling, that the fire hasn’t caught onto his clothes again, that the open door to the street is still there.

He stumbles through the threshold into the open street before him, almost tripping down the landing steps. The air here isn’t  _ clear _ but it’s  _ better _ . He gets a deep breath that sets him coughing. His chest aches. He can’t breathe like this -- dimly, he hears the sounds of shouting behind the cacophony of burning buildings.

As difficult as any other steps might be, he can’t stay here. The first drop of rain falls and something that sounds both like thunder and the onrushing of a stampede rumbles across the sky. Salieri takes a step and his foot gives out on him.

There’s not time or awareness for him to catch his fall. So he hits the street shoulder first with a whine of pain and doesn’t have the energy left to get back up. It hurts. There’s no part of him that doesn’t hurt. The violin weighs reassuringly on his chest ( _ not all is lost _ ) as everything else in his world hurts. Salieri shifts onto his back and stares blankly at the darkened sky as rain starts to fall over him.

Thunder crackles. The Wild Hunt runs on. The vanguard has scampered past and with the storm comes the King. The sound of a house collapsing echoes in Salieri’s ears and he shuts his eyes, praying that no fire or wood falls onto him now, when he can’t run. Lobo steps, briefly, into the human plane in the space between lightning and its thunder, where the Hunters wore thin the divide.

A great wolf stands for an instant in a human town, rain falling over his fur and the sharp reek of burning settlement making his nose wrinkle. Hessian notes the burning house and next, a person lying flat in the road with the smell of blood and smoke clinging like a shroud. Something else, too, that makes Hessian tug back on Lobo’s scruff.  _ Pause _ . Not a common order or an appreciated one, but Lobo listens. Lightning flashes again and everything seems to freeze ina sickly bleached glow.

Salieri opens his eyes. A wolf stands in front of him.

No, this can’t be called a wolf.

Something almost in the shape of a wolf stands in front of him.

It’s massive, and only seems more so from Salieri’s position laying at its feet. Almost the size of a house, with bluish flames licking the corners of its mouth and smoke flickering off its haunches that glows in the light that’s gone strange. The rain seems to have forgotten to fall. The shadow at its feet ripples beneath it as if slowly boiling. Salieri stares up at it, immobilized by the utter certainty that this, now, is where he is going to die. That this thing does not care about him at best and would enjoy ripping his stomach open at worst. He left the house fire when he wasn’t meant to and now the fire is here to bite his throat.

He’s holding his breath without realizing it, and feels like his heart should be stopped as well, were it not for the sound of it in his ears. Unconsciously, Salieri’s fingers tighten against his violin case. The sheer mundanity of the instrument against his chest is grounding.

After what is both a single moment and a stretch of eons, the wolf looks down at him. An electric shock, jolting through Salieri in a thrill of pain and fear. Its gaze is filled with dripping blue fire and Salieri’s consciousness lights up in the burn of it -- nothing physical, but all the more inescapable for it. Worse than the house fire. The certainty of an uncaring death. The wilderness rushing forward. The earth, years after humanity dies out, still spinning, and a cold  _ memento mori _ . 

Salieri waits for its jaws to close around him, unable to look away. 

Lobo flattens his ears back, casting around in his mental space for the reason that his rider tugged him to stop. Pity is not a common thing. They’ve trampled over towns before. It’s the cycle of the world, Hessian should know that. From the base of Lobo’s neck, Hessian gestures in a manner unseen and unfelt, but sensed nonetheless.

The case held in the human’s arms.

And? Lobo asks back, with some annoyance. His sentiment echoes in Hessian’s thoughts in an odd way -- it doesn’t  _ exactly _ have words, but he gets the sense, and it’s rearranged into an echoing silent conversation between them.

The case is one for a violin, Hessian informs Lobo, and having a musician will save the trouble of having to travel to Drake’s for the annual gathering. 

Lobo exhales a sharp huff, as close to a vocalized “ _ fine _ ” as Hessian’s going to get. Lobo looks back away from Salieri, who feels as if a weight has been lifted from his chest. He inhales again. From Lobo’s back, an arm is raised. It’s the first time Salieri notices that  _ anything _ is on the wolf, as shadows gather torn tendrils around it. Black jagged magic curls around Hessian’s arm.

Like misshapen claws, they descend around Salieri and tighten before he has time to even try and fight back. He manages to try and swat at them while still keeping the violin case in a vice grip, with a loud but wordless angry yelling. It doesn’t do anything to free him, as instead the claws curl tighter around him and keep him still. He swears at one as it winds its way around the collar of his jacket and shirt, tearing a hole through the fabric so it can lift him up like a fish on a line, kicking furiously. Wriggling doesn’t release him, and likely puts him in danger of breaking something else if he hears fabric ripping, but it still makes Salieri feel at least like he did fight back his own…abduction, death, whatever this is.

Whatever it is, as he’s hefted inelegantly onto the back of the wolf and deposited gracelessly, slung uncomfortably and awkwardly at the base of its neck. All he can see is fur and something black. Salieri turns his head enough to process that it’s someone’s knee, which is not what he expected but it is oddly reassuring that there’s a  _ person _ he’s dealing with, rather than just a monstrous beast. “Put me -- ghmf?!” The shadows around his neck shift and push him down, cheek pressed into Lobo’s fur. Trying to push himself up gets something winding around his arms and keeping them in place, too. Salieri snarls. He has choice words for that, but there’s not even a second to process before there’s a great shifting under him and the wolf leaps into motion.

Hessian merely ensures his unwilling passenger is kept still. It’s not ideal, but… eh. Too difficult to explain quickly, and time presses uncomfortably against his and Lobo’s back here. They can’t stay still for long, this couple seconds of divergence was already a difficult length of time to spend near humanity. It’s fine. He’ll explain and give the deal later, and if it’s not accepted, they’ll drop the human off… somewhere. Better than falling off Lobo mid-jaunt.

Lobo doesn’t wait to take back off. He bound into the rush of the Wild Hunt with a loud barking and merges seamlessly back into his place as its center, unimpeded by the new weight on him.

Salieri feels it as a rush of wind and the air going sharply cold, smelling of pine and ozone. It makes his skin prickle. The blood drying on his foot feels sharp and electric (wiggling his foot to see if anything has happened results only in reaffirming the certainty that he shouldn’t have done that). A distinctly human hand pats his shoulder (really, Hessian is vaguely aware the shift out of human reality is  _ probably _ jarring, and attempts to be consoling). It doesn’t come across as anything other than a further confusing thing that makes Salieri want to yell an affront at the state of the universe. Don’t patronize him, damn it.

Yelling still isn’t going to accomplish anything, but he gives a largely incoherent diatribe about how this is neither his day  _ nor _ his month into Lobo’s fur, cut off early by coughing and a wave of dizziness. Salieri loses track of who or where he is as the surrounding environment becomes only the sounds of howling animals he can’t see and the all-out sprint of a wolf.


	2. the things in the forest

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> we call him antonio "anger issues" salieri

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this and the upcoming chapter were supposed to be one unit but then it ended up being like one fucktrillion words as an npc helpfully exposits for me

The Hunt doesn’t need to  _ catch _ anything. Most of the time. It’s enough to chase, hunt down whichever of its members wants to be speediest until they’re caught in a (largely) harmless to themselves tumble, to chase after the concept of the wind itself, to run and howl because it’s an embodied storm and a remorseless declaration of might. The pack gambols, chased by thunder, until they’re worn out.

So it goes. Hessian’s function is to watch. Be the other half of Lobo, in the sense of an inhuman dichotomy, and the sense of order and lack thereof. Currently, it’s also to keep a hand (or more accurately, the branching vines of his magic) around the human’s jacket so he doesn’t fall. It serves mostly to make him feel naggingly guilty, though this was still his idea. Abducting people is not his usual lot. It’ll be fine, but the distance between now and that ideal future tense is slightly concerning. It probably would have been  _ better _ to make an invitation, but what’s done is done and this is certainly  _ easier _ .

It’s also easier that said human has stopped struggling, for less that he’s a problem and more that it’s one less thing for Hessian to be taking note of. How long has he been stuck there…? Time flows strangely in places like this. Maybe he didn’t survive the transition.

No, wait, he’s breathing. That answers that. As for how fine their guest is or isn’t: a puzzle answered as Lobo tumbles back into his home, comfortably worn out and with a number of closer spirits following him into the courtyard. Hessian shoulders their unwilling guest, still bound about the upper torso and barely conscious, and hops off Lobo’s back.

Their home is a large stone building in a place that isn’t quite settled in reality, all dark stone and ivy, a courtyard and main hall large enough to comfortably fit quite a few wolves of Lobo’s size, with living quarters for the more humanoid creatures residing here on an attached wing. That side is where Hessian walks. Salieri slowly starts gathering his consciousness back to himself, stitching back together after a strange kind of vertigo that was more spiritual than physical.

A faintly glowing wisp in the form of a rather large cat breaks off from the entourage around Lobo to scamper after Hessian’s retreating bootstrap and, more importantly, his very unusual cargo. She switches back to her more customary human body as soon as she’s caught up, shoes tapping loudly on the floor as she skips alongside in a flouncing of frills. “Who do you have? Oh! Are we going to invite them to a party?” 

She tries to chatter further questions but is cut off with a quick gesture from Hessian’s free hand. Not yet, kid. He can hear her make a noise of complaint, though he doesn’t take it for sincere. The request he signs for her is half-incoherent considering he’s limited to a single hand, but she gives a prompt “of course!” and pitter-patters right back off regardless. Good enough.

Salieri manages to gather himself enough to blink his eyes open and realize he is, in fact, a person. Next to follow is that he is a person whose arms are still bound fully still against his chest (which is deeply uncomfortable, actually, now that he’s realizing things) and he can’t move his legs. After that, the fact that he’s floating down a hallway in a place that seems hazy, like he’s dreaming if he weren’t also comprised largely of aching (something generally left out of dreams). An utterly unfamiliar place, with high ceilings and a dark rug extending underfoot.

Oh, wait. Not floating. Being carried. His cheek is pressed into a shoulder under thick black fabric. Salieri shifts to try and see  _ who _ is carrying him, and -- yelps. That’s not anybody. He was expecting a lot, but none of the options included ‘a completely empty collar, occupied only by shadow and the vague hint of smoke’. That’s -- 

But the noise makes Hessian turn to look at Salieri (something Salieri finds deeply unsettling, watching a collar shift like  _ something’s _ looking at him and not being able to see  _ what _ ). 

Hessian can tell the look of someone trying to battle out if fear or indignation is going to win -- he respects that, actually, that it’s at least a competition. Fear is generally all he gets. He holds up a finger in a universal sign of ‘ _ give me a second, please _ ’.

That tips the favour completely over to indignation. “Wh--! You’re telling me to  _ wait _ ? Do you think I have a  _ choice _ ? Let me down and I’ll. Gah.” Salieri threatens, with decidedly ineffectual attempts to free himself, and Hessian calmly proceeds to completely ignore him. It’ll get dealt with.

He doesn’t hear anyone approaching, but he does notice Salieri going quiet and looking over his shoulder, which means that his requested help is here. Hessian glances back to check and is met with a slight girl draped in purple jogging to catch up with him, a bundle balanced against her chest. “Sorry, it took me a moment to gather everything.”

Hessian waves it off, meaning not to worry about it, and gestures for her to follow him into one of the adjacent rooms offshooting the wing’s main hall. 

While Lobo’s hall does not get  _ human _ guests, it has its fair share of human _ oid _ guests, and the population of inhabitants tends to fluctuate without much warning. Ergo, a number of rooms for guests and newcomers. It’s a small bedroom Hessian nudges his way into, or small compared to the scale of everything else. It’s lit with yellow wisp-flame the sparks up upon someone entering, and furnished only with ill-used simple bed, a half-full bookshelf, and one piece of furniture that can’t decide if it’s a nightstand or a desk.

Salieri watches the door close behind him as the purple girl slips through, and has absolutely no idea what he’s being brought into until he’s abruptly sideways before he has time to adjust.

The girl quickly walks over to place the bowl of water she’s carrying on the nightstand, something Salieri notes only in a glimpse as he’s deposited on the bed. The shadows binding his arms unfurl slowly, but as soon as any part of Salieri’s free he’s trying to pull himself further away from it. He grabs one of the coils, ignores the painful stretch against his burned hands, and tries to rip the whole thing off of him.

Hessian frets, torn between the want to keep this person  _ still  _ before they worsen whatever other parts of them are hurt, and the obvious fact that Hessian’s method of doing so is not exactly welcome. He gestures vaguely but emphatically, uncertain and concerned. The magic retreats a little further, releasing Salieri and slinking self-consciously back into the shadows.

Salieri gives them a kick in parting with his unbroken foot. “Get  _ off _ , what the hell--” Salieri shoves himself backwards with a snarl. Immediately, the girl hovering to the side holds her hands up in surrender, fabric bundle held between her elbow and side.

“Wait, wait,” she says, gently and to little effect.

Now that she’s taken Salieri’s attention for a moment, Hessian decides his presence here will probably make things worse and as such makes himself scarce. The door closes quietly behind him before Salieri has time to notice he’s trying to disappear until he’s already gone.

Hessian not being around does make things slightly better. With the thing that brought him here gone and a lack of all magical restraints present, Salieri can turn his focus exclusively to the young girl. It’s hard to be angry or scared towards someone who looks so profoundly harmless, though intellectually he knows appearances don’t account for much.

She stands still a careful distance away, hands up and palms empty. “It’s fine,” she says. She’s a wisp of a girl who seems to be rather young, with a cascade of purple hair she has tied into a loose ponytail. Her clothes are outdated but formal, and seem to take some vague notes from Grecian paintings; a loose pale teal dress of layered fabric, open shoulder and with a sheer sash of purple cast over one shoulder and pinned at her waist with a silver clasp in the shape of interlocking circles. She looks oddly faint at her feet, as if her sandals and the ribbons tying them up her legs are slowly fading to translucent, and the hem of her dress and sash float faintly.

Salieri frowns at her. “It’s fine, I promise,” she says again. “I know Hessian’s scary and probably was not very nice when he brought you here but, uhm. We don’t really make a habit of stealing people! And while he hasn’t told me yet why you’re here, I really promise you it won’t be anything bad.” Largely because if either Hessian or Lobo wanted this man dead, he wouldn’t need to be back here for that. Nor would her assistance be called for. 

“So…” she trails off expectantly, now clasping her hands in front of her like she’s a some kind of professional attendant. “I was called to give medical care. Can I see your leg?”

Salieri sighs and allows himself to relax, shove off some of the suspicion, at least. She seems sincere enough, and the persistent throbbing in his ankle prevents him from ignoring the fact that he’s going to need  _ someone _ to look at it. “Fine,” he says.

The girl perks up immediately. “Good! Thank you.” She walks over with a businesslike gait, though it’s completely silent where footsteps should be. Salieri leaves his bad leg extended and draws the other up close to his chest so he can lean propped against it and his violin case, watching the girl carefully as she places her bundles -- which now prove to be a black packet and a folded set of hand towels -- down on the bed next to Salieri’s foot.

“Who are you?” Salieri asks her. Maybe he should say 'what', but 'who' is probably nicer.  


She glances over at him only briefly before looking back to his leg. She tucks a strand of hair behind her ear (pointed, strange, Salieri notes). The hair moves like a wisp of smoke, or as if  she’s underwater. “I’m a nurse,” she answers. “You can call me Medea. I’m going to get to work, please hold still and let me know if anything hurts too bad, alright?”

Salieri mumbles an acknowledgement and drops his head back down to rest on his drawn-up knee. He can’t hear Medea move herself, but he can hear her pulling things from the parcel she brought. “Are you a fairy?” Likely as anything else.

He gets a quiet laugh in response. “No, not really.” Medea meticulously rolls up Salieri’s pant leg and tugs his sock off with a sort of precision that seems it would fit better in a surgical suite. It doesn’t hurt enough to complain to her. “But if you know about fairy tales, you should imagine you’re in one. It helps to not get you in trouble accidentally if you think of yourself following fairy tale rules. Like, be nice to strangers and don’t tell anyone they can take your name. If you’re talking to a ghost or a Hunter can be hard to tell for visitors and it’s better safe than sorry.” She moves to set the bowl of water from the nightstand closer to Salieri’s leg and starts cleaning away dried blood from a cut transversing Salieri’s leg. Her movements are exactly as light and careful as when she was freeing his ankle from fabric.

Blood reveals bruises when washed away, most of which make Salieri’s breath draw sharp when Medea skims over them. It hurts, but he can handle it. Medea does her best to avoid pressing any harder than absolutely necessary. There’s a song hummed under her breath: ‘ _ pain, pain, go away... _ ’.

It’s definitely not the  _ exact _ shape it’s supposed to be, but at least the joint’s not particularly deformed. There are some upsides. “Sir? It’s broken. I’m going to have to push on it to make sure everything’s in place, sorry. It’ll hurt.”

Fine, sure. That’s about how Salieri’s month has been going for him. He sighs. “Go ahead.” He’s… he’d like to say he’s had worse, but this is about as low as he’s gotten, might as well have a teenager shove his ankle into place and try not to bite his lip open while she’s at it. This may as well happen.


	3. residents dead and living

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Medea continues storytime. Salieri contemplates.  
> Wildfire still manages to plague him.

Medea’s careful. The bones are ensured where they’re supposed to be, and she’s secretly impressed Salieri hasn’t cried. He just pressed his forehead against his knee and bit back a pained noise that made Medea wince in sympathy, but the trial was over with quickly. The materials she was able to scrounge up with for a splint aren’t great, but they’ll do for a time.

Salieri watches her work carefully once she stops shoving on things that hurt badly. It doesn’t make sense for him to get picked up by something that feels like death, only to be immediately deposited until the care of someone who  _ sounds _ , at least, keen on answering his questions honestly. He assumes if he’s kidnapped by a pack of monsters and told he’s in a house of what are apparently children’s tale villains or something then he’s here for something dark, not for something that results in him being carefully patched up by a teenager.

Meaning he’s here for what,  _ pity _ ? That doesn’t seem right, either. There is no innate skill he offers that would make anyone or any _ thing _ want to grab him.

Is this what happened to Amadeus, too? Is some other poor bastard going to get blamed for  _ Salieri’s _ disappearance this time around? Ha, ha, as if he’s valued enough to have someone need to be at fault. He could laugh. But, still. Maybe it’s got something to do with that guy. Salieri looks down at the curve of the violin case against his stomach. There’s metal embossed on the other end, in a symbol Amadeus had made as something of a joint emblem. Salieri presses his fingers against it (and the cold metal offers some relief against the burne.) Entwined vines and sets of wings. It’s  _ his _ instrument, and Salieri was carrying it, so maybe that….

Still, he’s not Amadeus. He’s no one, and deserves (going off his general luck lately) the universe spitting on him. Can’t wait for these guys to figure out who he  _ isn’t _ , Salieri thinks bitterly. But he may as well ask instead of being non-productive and silently pessimistic. “Why am I here?” Salieri speaks up, his voice quiet.

Medea shakes her head apologetically. “I don’t know.”

“What  _ do _ you know?”

Medea pauses for a moment, considering. There’s both quite a lot and not very much that she knows about this place, despite staying here as long as she has. Perhaps there are things which Hessian or Lobo want to keep uncertain, but it seems cruel to do so…. 

Gently, Medea secures her wooden splint in place and keeps herself focused on only that action. “This place… isn’t one for humans. There aren’t any here, and without Lobo bringing you, you never would have found it. If you leave the castle, you’ll end up in a forest that’s just the same way, where you can’t find your way back to the human side without a guide. I don’t know why you’re here, but please don’t try to run before you find out.”

Salieri sighs and drops his head against his knee. “Great,” he mutters. Not that he would have gotten far or had the  _ thought _ to try and flee the place until she said it, but he doesn’t appreciate being thoroughly stuck in a place he wasn’t apparently ever meant to be.

Medea finishes tying, then waits a second before she reaches out and taps Salieri’s forearm. “Can I check your hands?” It wasn’t pointed out to her as something to fix, but the entire man here smells like smoke and looks particularly singed about the forearm. Salieri agrees wordlessly by extending his arm for her to look over.

The fact that her touch is freezing is much more evident over the burns than it was over his foot. Medea sets about her medicine, careful around any rising blisters, adding a thing layer of cold ointment and bandaging what’s practical to do so. It’s quiet work, and Salieri finds that it thankfully hurts less than dealing with his foot.

None of the burns seem deep enough to cause any lasting damage, which Medea is about to inform him of when Salieri abruptly asks a question before she can speak. “Were you trapped here, too?”

It takes Medea back for a second, though she supposed it is fair to assume. “No! No. I.” She trails off again and frowns, self conscious. Salieri’s about to tell her that it’s fine, but she speaks before him. “I came here. It’s a place in between other places. I’m, ah… dead. A ghost.” A pause. “Are you afraid?” Medea looks up at him now, a small frown on her face as she holds Salieri’s hand in both of hers.

Salieri snorts. “I was picked up from my own burning house by a monster wolf and headless soldier with magic and put in what’s apparently an inescapable castle that humans can’t be in, and you think I’d be afraid of  _ you _ in all that? Sorry, but ghost or not, you’re the least frightening thing so far. You’re also the one patching me up,” he adds almost as an afterthought.

Fair. “Well, Hessian was the one who told me to come here.” Medea can’t help but want to give a slight defense of the other castle inhabitants.

“Hessian - that’s the headless one’s name?”

“Ah, yes. Lobo is the wolf.”

Salieri raises his eyebrows. “That’s self-explanatory.” Next thing he’ll be told is that Medea’s name is originally Mädchen or somesuch.

“He’s nice, I promise! He just takes some getting used to. Lobo isn’t really  _ nice _ , but he’s… direct, is a way to put it. He won’t hurt you without a warning or reason.”

Salieri makes a vague noise of acknowledgement before falling silent once more as Medea finishes her work. He has plenty enough to contemplate. While he doesn’t trust much of this, he’d like to at least trust Medea. Dead or alive, she still appears to be a nice kid. He’ll put off taking her word about how nice her compatriots may or may not be, but he  _ will _ hesitantly put some faith in her statement that he’ll be fine for the time being.

Especially considering he doesn’t seem to have much a choice  _ but _ accepting it. Salieri keeps quiet until Medea has successfully patched up both his hands and he’s free to draw his limbs back. She looks up first, and Salieri takes the moment to ask: “Are you the only ghost here?”

Medea shakes her head. “No, there’s a few. I’m just the only one good at medicine. There’s a handful of people who live here. You’ll probably see them soon, unless Hessian shoos them off, since you’re the only living human who’s come here in… well, since I can remember.” She smiles brightly then and claps her hands together. “It’s nice to make friends with someone ‘normal’... ehm, mister.” As normal as it gets around here, in human terms.

Salieri blinks. The reminder that he did not actually inform her of his name (gift or otherwise) strikes him. “Oh. My name’s Antonio. Or Salieri. You can use whichever you like for me, it’s fine.” He would say it’s nice to meet her as well, but… it feels a bit too insincere, given the current circumstances. He flexes his fingers uncomfortably and feels the twinging tug against the burns. Medea doesn’t seem to mind the lack of formalities.

“Thank you, Mr. Antonio! Do you have anything else hurt?”

“Only bruises, I think.”

Medea sighs, shakes her head, and looks at Salieri with an expression that seems to read ‘ _ oh, what am I going to do with you _ ’ -- it’s an expression motherly enough that it’s downright jarring to see it on a teenager’s face. “You,” she says, resigned, “should really try to be more careful.”

Salieri frowns at her, which she disregards. “As for right now, there’s nothing else I can do to help. You should really get some sleep, though. Knowing everybody here….” Medea hums thoughtfully and mentally ticks off names on her fingers. “I’ll tell Hessian to find some clothes for you and Boudica should already be aware you’ll eat breakfast, so the morning should be accounted for.” She claps her hands together with a realization and brightens immediately. “Do you like pancakes?”

The shift in tone is abrupt and unexpected enough for Salieri to need another few moments to process the question. He blinks. “What?”

“Pancakes! They’re my and Rhyme’s favourite, so if you like them, I can use it as an excuse to get Boudica to make us all some tomorrow morning.”

Ah. Yes. This certainly is a kid he’s talking to, huh. The names she mentions fly completely over Salieri’s head, but that’s a problem for… tomorrow, apparently. She  _ did _ just spend the better part of a couple hours patching up his injuries, the least he could do is enable her. So, he nods. “Sure?” 

The idea of going from discussing how he’s currently been dragged into some kind of ghost prison to immediately dunking into a conversation that sounds more fitting for showing up at a friend’s country home for a weekend still has Salieri struggling to catch up with the shift, though. Medea gathers up the remains of her medical accoutrement, ensures Salieri’s foot is securely balanced on the towel she’d used to clean it, and smiles proudly at him.

“Alright!” Since that’s all sorted out for the time being. “I’ll be back later. Please actually sleep, but if you need anything, just call my name in the hall and I’ll show up.” One of the perks of being a ghost and thus being able to disappear and reappear at the sound of her name without worrying about missing sleep. She gives Salieri a polite nod and makes her leave.

The door shuts behind Medea with an odd sort of finality. Salieri watches it blankly. The light in the room seems to dim a little.

It feels much more oppressive here without someone else in the room. A reminder that he certainly is alone without anything familiar -- at least someone else talking with him was  _ someone else _ , and now it’s isolation and the quiet.

There’s no way Salieri’s going to sleep. He just watches the door and thinks.

In the hallway, Medea’s careful to shut the door quietly. A job well done, surely, and what’s left is to report back to-- oh. She makes a quiet, bemused noise when she turns and looks down the hall. “Were you really that worried?”

Hessian jerks to attention from where he’d been leaning against the wall a short ways away. He gestures defensively, in something Medea imagines is the sign language equivalent of spluttering before settling with “Not particularly.”

“Well!” She chirps, clasping her hands behind her back as she hops down to talk to her boss face-to-face (or face-to-shadow? whatever it is). She’ll accompany him back to the main room. “He’ll be fine, just a little banged up. He doesn’t trust you at all, which shouldn’t surprise you.” Come to think of it, she may as well ask. “Why  _ did _ you decide we needed a living human? I hope you’re not going to make a habit of it.”

Hessian shrugs. Medea watches him sign the answer. “He’s attached to that violin case. I thought I could save a trip to the Kremlin this year.”

“Ah, so you just felt like it.” Medea giggles. She can tell Hessian’s ‘ _ hey now! _ ’ reaction without looking over. “If you start acting on impulse, Lobo will have to become the rational one, so save us the trouble. He seems kind, though.”

A vague assent. Hessian knows better than to cause problems. “Did you learn his name?”

“Antonio Salieri.  _ Not _ ours to take, sir.” (She cuts off a signed protest of ‘I know!’) “Are you going to draw a contract? I’ll tell Boudica to plan accordingly. Oh! His clothes smell like smoke and it’s unpleasant, so can you leave out some clothes of yours for me to bring him tomorrow?” There’s not anyone else who’d have something fitting on hand.

Hessian ducks his shoulders in a way that equates to a nod. Something else he forgot he’d have to arrange, huh… well, it’s simple enough. Medea chirps an approval before skipping off, leaving Hessian to amble back to his own chores. Alright, things to do before he sleeps.

* * *

Salieri expected not to sleep. There’s enough going on and enough to mull over that he doesn’t  _ need _ to sleep, what with the pressing anxieties and paranoia of being wherever  _ here _ is.

But the lights are low now, and everything that’s happened makes him exhausted, if he likes it or not.

He doesn’t notice falling asleep. By default, he also doesn’t notice when someone cracks his door open and sneaks in with a suppressed giggle. Tiny blue sparks of light ignite around her, like fireflies to make sure she doesn’t trip in the dark. Alright! If no one’s here, then she’ll play guard dog. (She was admittedly hoping that the stranger would be  _ awake _ , but… sure, she does acknowledge that sleep is good for people. Boudica’s said as much!)

She pulls a book from the room’s shelf and settles in a seat to be a good and responsible guard dog. “You can go out now,” she whispers at the dull orange lights still glowing in the corners. “I have my own.” They extinguish themselves immediately, and the little blue flames gather around the pages of her newly found book to make up for the loss.

Easy-peasy!

Eventually, the sense that something’s watching him percolates through Salieri’s awareness.

He doesn’t know what, or how to clarify the feeling any further -- it’s not an  _ unnerving _ kind of watching, not by something that wants to harm him. Just, the feeling something is keeping an eye out, and doing so close enough to him that the feeling slowly pushes Salieri into being awake.

Slowly, Salieri manages to crack an eye open, still addled by the pressing haze of sleep. Something sits in the chair near his bed. It’s a silhouette, surrounded by slowly floating wisps of flame. Salieri blinks. The blurry shape takes focus into something approximating a person.

It’s dark aside from those little blue ephemera. The light is just enough to show a young girl, or something in the shape of one, dressed in black and pink, and with stark white hair that reflects the light of her firefly-esque companions. She holds a book in her lap, oversized, that Salieri can’t discern the name of. An attempt to speak. The words stick against his tongue. He’s not awake enough for the words to come out as anything other than a wordless confused mumble. 

It’s enough to get attention. The girl looks up from her book and smiles at him. When her eyes catch the reflection of the fairy lights, they gleam bright like a cat’s. “Sssh,” she says with a finger raised to her lips. “It’s too late for an adventure. The lonely you and the nameless me can meet in the morning. Scary mister dullahan won’t be the only one who can’t find their head if you fall into someone else’s dream.” A little laugh at the joke with herself.

Salieri’s not sure if it’s his brain catching up to him causing her words to sound like nonsense or if that’s what she’s actually saying. “Yes..?” he asks instead.

She giggles and shakes her head. “Didn’t you hear, silly? Back to sleep. The curtain rises just with the sun. Then the play can start.”

Now he’s certain she’s barely talking sense. Salieri tries to get up, but the shock of pain thrumming through his leg when he accidentally shifts it too much makes him waver. The girl tuts at him. A bookmark is placed with a flourish to mark her spot and she hops off the chair. “Have your own dream. Just for a while, of someone with plenty of friends and a lovely welcoming party. ” 

Before Salieri can move properly, her fingers tap him lightly on the forehead. His vision swims and he feels himself falling to the side. It’s strange, as if something is unfolding beneath him to tug him down.

A title-less Rhyme watches for a second or two after their guest is pushed back to sleep, making sure he won’t be getting back up. She nods to herself, proud of her responsible choices to ensure everyone’s well and rested, before seating herself back in the chair and opening her book once more. The wisps settle back around her to illuminate the letters enough to read. It’s a charming story about a strange cat, enough to while away the time until she can greet the new one properly.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> when i was a little kid i would wake my mom up in the middle of the night when i needed her (for kid things like feeling sick or whatever) simply by staring dead at her silently in the dark. she inevitably woke up after a few minutes or two. the reasons i did this are varied, but in retrospect i am sincerely impressed at the ability of humans to wake up simply thru the power of being Watched.
> 
> nr: owo?  
> salieri waking up out of a dead sleep: hey, what the fuck?


	4. 'i'll go!' exclaimed margarita nikolaevna

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Nursery Rhyme organizes enough: the table is set, the play is staged! Well, sort of.  
> A contract is writ and voiced and signed.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> debates just adding "implied past mozart/salieri" as an extra tag but w/e u know

Dawn and twilight last a lot longer than they should. Such is life, here. Either way, by Rhyme’s best measure it has been a good enough handful of hours and she has since confirmed the presence elsewhere in the house of breakfast. Ergo, she’s done waiting.

Nursery Rhyme hops onto the bed, doing her best to be completely graceless and send Salieri lurching over. “It’s the morning now. The day is rosy-cheeked. So, of course, it’s time to get up!” A person she put to sleep, a person she shall rise! A nicely cyclical affair, she decides happily as Salieri flails an arm in bleary bewilderment. 

Salieri grunts in confusion and tilts his head over, confused as to who is there, where is here, who is he, why is this -- the full gamut. A girl blinks doe-round lilac eyes at him with a wide smile. “I wanted to bring you down to breakfast with everyone, but Medea said I shouldn’t make you walk all that way without something to lean on.” That answers none of the questions he asked himself, but does give him time to procure the answers on his own.

Salieri mumbles incomprehensibly, brows furrowed. Rhyme inspects him: she didn’t get a good look before. How odd, to find a human with such gold eyes, but the rest of him looks a little too worse for wear to be a charming protagonist. He’s still got a smear of soot on his face. How sad! She'll have to fix that. “Good morning?” he finally manages to offer her.

Rhyme’s grin widens and she settles back with a pleased clap. “I can only hope it will be.” She clambers back to stand on the floor and straightens her dress out. “The table is set and dressings are made! Well, sort of. There’s a table here, and soon there’ll be pancakes on it, and Medea brought some clothes for you. I said I would be in charge of sorting things out, since I wanted to say hello.” She shall be the member of the Hunt to vet the visitors, thank you! A self-declared but self-decided as important position. 

Salieri by this point has managed to sit up and get mostly awake, watching her talk with a bleary sort of nonchalance.  She reminds him of one of his students. All things considered, it’s a decent thing to face at the moment. He yawns despite his best attempts to suppress the gesture. “Thank you. You’re…?”

“Hmm. I’m a nameless story told here and there. A nursery rhyme for other children. So, I’m called Nursery Rhyme. And you’re the lonely violinist, taken from there and placed here.” Rhyme curtsies and pays no heed to Salieri attempting to turn over what she’s said. “Your name is Mr. Salieri, right? I can call you that.”

Salieri agrees with a dismissive nod and shifts to follow Rhyme to standing up properly. 

He’s reminded of his current physical situation when putting weight on his foot results in his leg folding under him from the sudden pain, barely avoid swearing in front of the kid, and catches himself by grabbing the headboard.  This morning is not his forte. “Are you alright?” Rhyme asks, in the most sincere expression of concern Salieri has heard from anyone in the past two months. Ah, that’s… depressing. “Sir?”

“Uhm.” Right. Responses. “I’m fine.” He’s not, clearly, but it’s the thought that counts. Salieri re-adjusts both physically and mentally, and settles on a method of standing that puts minimal weight on his broken foot. Standing makes him aware of a whole gamut of fun other scrapes and aches decorated randomly over his body -- the past 24 hours were less kind to him than he’d imagined, and falling asleep curled over his own knee didn't help. Salieri sighs and decides he’s got no options other than dealing with it.

Rhyme cants her head to the side as she watches Salieri figure his situation out. After a courteous pause, she holds out a hand for him. “Do you want me to show you where the baths are? You’re still messy."

Fair. Self awareness gets ever heavier on Salieri, and she's right; he's uncomfortable and he may as well take care of himself so he can hunt down and yell at the thing that brought him here without looking like he fell down a chimney on the way. He takes Rhyme’s hand and allows her to pass him some fabric and help him half-hop down the hall. 

She says he can lean a bit harder on her, she might be short but she’s not  _ fragile _ , although Salieri really can’t morally allow that. A little too pitiable and immature alike of him if he did.  


The hall now is more populated than it was when Salieri last walked though. Rhyme pulls him along without a pause in her step. A fox bounds past them the opposite direction, much larger than a natural fox and with moss growing upon its tail. Places to go. A few wisps of flame float about much more idly along the walls, which are interspersed with doors similar to the one Salieri emerged from. The walls themselves are dark granite, the occasional painting or hanging fabric to decorate them.

Someone who looks to be a human walks by, hand in hand with an enormous monstrous centaur that makes Salieri double-take. The girl waves in passing to Nursery Rhyme, who curtsies back while pulling Salieri along still. He can’t exactly keep track of everything that he notices, as his attention is distracted by a many-legged furry thing the size of his arm that weaves its way along, up the wall, and peers curiously at Salieri from some feet above eye level.

Nursery Rhyme pulls him to a door and gestures him in to the bath room hiding behind. He can sort himself out. It’s a public space, but it’s polite to not involve oneself in someone else's cleaning up! 

So Rhyme leans against the wall, with only a moment or three before someone she’s friends with appears. Ibaraki-Douji patters by, stopping once she sees Rhyme holding still and alone for once. 

Rhyme waves brightly. “Hello, little wildfire. Your horns look different today. Are they gazelle? It’s cute.”

Ibaraki huffs exaggeratedly, hands on her hips. “I’m not cute, I’m intimidating and grandiose.”

“Mm-hm! That too.”

She’ll take it, though she gives Rhyme an evaluating frown to let her know she’s on thin ice. Ibaraki leans to peer around her shoulder as if she’ll see anything other than a wooden door behind her. “I heard someone new’s here?” she asks.

“Yup!” Rhyme chimes.

Interesting. Ibaraki shifts her weight musingly. “Is it a cute girl?”

Rhyme shakes her head. “Nope.”

“Oh.” Ibaraki deflates and looks back at Rhyme. “Then what’s the point?”

That is not a question Rhyme has the answer to. She’d provide Shuten if she could, really! "He seems nice. He didn't even snap at Medea when he got brought here." Like a certain oni once did. Ibaraki merely scowls at her, disappointed, and grumbles about the choice of residents here before infomring Rhyme she’s going to tell Lobo to be more discerning with the strays he grabs. 

Rhyme politely decides not to point out that she  _ also _ chose to live in this domain as a stray, but it’s fine.

Salieri reappears after a bit, hair wet and with decidedly no smudges or scent of soot on the rest of him, though he feels something of the fire is stuck under his nails forever. He’s obliged Rhyme by using the clothes she offered to him, which are too large in the way where he somehow looks like a chronically underfed waif more than a normal adult man wearing someone else’s shirt. 

As soon as Salieri’s free of the door, Rhyme hops up into midair, letting her form shift into that of an oversized and noticeably iridescent black cat that completes the rest of the jump.  It’s easier to perch against Salieri’s shoulder that way. 

He catches her with a stumble and an “ _ oof _ ”, but he  _ does _ still catch her. Rhyme presses a paw into his cheek. “You look a little less like a sad puppy, now,” she informs him, pleased. 

“That’s not much of a compliment,” Salieri grumbles, between trying to figure how he’s supposed to adjust to her weight. She’s not as light as she looks like she should be. Rhyme shifts from his cheek to fixing his bangs. Paws aren't the best for that, but they manage. If she brushes them a little differently, their hair would almost match (except his is much shorter), and she does find that fact rather fun. Salieri doesn’t: “I’m fine, can you -- am I supposed to carry you back?”

Rhyme sighs, because it’s such a shame when no one wants to play along with her, and hops back down. She lands in the body of a human once more. 

Salieri finds _that_ manageable, at least, and he can shuffle alongside her.

“Are you… a person, or a cat?”

She frowns, more for show than actually being annoyed. “Why does it have to be  _ or _ ? I’m a rhyme.” Humans, always with black and white thinking. Well, she can’t fault him. He’s nice otherwise, and he’ll learn better. He does, at least, take that for an answer (or take that asking questions about people is not going to be particularly helpful. The end result is the same either way).

Salieri hasn’t seen the door corresponding to his borrowed room often enough to figure which one it is, though Rhyme points it out. The many-legged furry spirit from earlier has migrated to above the door frame, and watches upside-down as Salieri and Rhyme walk in. Salieri looks back at it, mostly to ensure he’s not going to shut the door and squish it, which keeps him from immediately noticing the cause when Rhyme chimes an “oh!”

“Hi!” Rhyme says. Salieri looks back down and jolts to an immediate halt. Hessian’s leaning against the wall of the room. He waves placidly at Rhyme. Salieri scowls and shifts immediately to stand in front of Rhyme, well aware it’s a nonsense kind of counter-intuitive. She  _ lives _ here, after all, but it’s something he thinks about only after he’s done it. “You!” Salieri starts. “You--” and he immediately cuts himself off with a glance toward Rhyme. Nothing children can’t hear, now. 

A deep inhale. “ _ What _ do you think you’re doing, and why does it involve  _ me _ ?”

_ Well _ , this is going to go great, Hessian thinks to himself. He was hoping that the ‘he seems nice’ Medea gave him would extend to him, but in retrospect that should have been immediately noted as impossible. Still, it’s not like Salieri manages to be particularly threatening. He’s a human, scuffed up and looking far too slight than can be imposing or healthy. About as threatening as a partridge. Truthfully, Hessian really wants to fix Salieri’s shirt collar. Not that things being out of place is particularly bothersome, just that he -- wants to tug at him, despite or because of the fact it’d make him snap. That, Hessian figures, is probably the feeling people have with barn cats. Sure, getting bitten is likely, but they  _ really _ want to reach over, because… eh, because..? --he digresses. 

Fortunate, probably, that no one can tell when he's spacing. Salieri assumes whatever's going on is something akin to _looming_ , and Rhyme doesn't care.

Rhyme slips out from behind Salieri’s legs, nearly tripping him, and making him stumble fully into the room with the door snapping shut. Salieri keeps his back against the door, arms now crossed. Rhyme skips to the table, largely disregarding Hessian now that he’s been greeted. “You’re here before I thought you’d be. Oh, Medea left the pancakes.” Much more interesting than whatever everyone else has going on.

Hessian taps a finger on the table to get her attention as she claims a plate of pancake for herself. She looks up. “Mm?”

“If you’re going to stay, don’t play too much in the discussion, alright?” Hessian signs.

“I know, I know. I’m not so irresponsible.” Just a little bit. For lack of chairs, she settles herself on the stiff bed instead, plate balanced on her knees.

Salieri watches the proceedings with a steadily returning feeling of absurdity. This  _ is _ the same weird headless ghost-monster who carted him around like a stolen sack of potatoes, though the offhanded way Rhyme speaks to him and the lack of the tattered and smoking traveling cloak makes him look almost like a normal person, until Salieri looks and is reminded of the entire  _ fully functional person with a wisp of smoke instead of a head _ part.

He takes a few shuffling steps closer. “ _ Rhyme _ being the irresponsible one is not what I’m worried about,” said with a bite. (He is rather annoyed that he cannot tell if he’s properly intimidating, or at least making Hessian as discomforted as he is, without a facial expression to gauge by.)

Hessian would sigh if he could. Yes, yes. He’s very irresponsible, at least four individuals have told him so in the past twenty-four hours. He should be allowed some impulses every so often, too. “I’ll show you.”

Salieri watches him gesture with a frown. “What’s that mean?”

He isn’t accusatory, merely suspicious, which Hessian takes to mean he has no idea how to read sign. Inconvenient, but utterly unsurprising. Not like his is very standard, anyways. Rhyme brightens up immediately. “Oh! He doesn’t understand, so I can translate for him. It’ll be fun! I’m quite reliable.” She beams expectantly at Hessian.

“I’ll write.” Hessian signs back. The beaming disappears. Rhyme eats a bite of pancake in a way that could best be described as let down.

This was the expected outcome, so he was prepared. Hessian grabs the notebook he’d left lying over and flicks to a clean page. The table gets as cleared as it’s going to get with a second plate of pancakes in the way, and he sets about writing.

Salieri inches closer, desire to see what’s being written during the process outweighing his wariness.

‘My name is Hessian. The wolf Lobo and I are together a king of the Wild Hunt.’ His writing is neat; following a straight line despite the page being without guidelines, angular, and compact. Thanks to practice, he writes quickly. Salieri watches the pen move attentively. ‘Yearly, a king of the Hunt is expected to host a gathering where a living soul is meant to work.’

He pauses. Salieri takes the opening to speak. “So you want me to work for you? Or my  _ soul _ \-- is this some Faustian engagement, then, because the answer’s no.”

‘You as a person.’ Though it’s an understandable assumption. Hessian will concede that. Salieri leans over the desk close enough to have bonked Hessian’s head with his if there was one to bonk, though Salieri doesn’t notice as he’s preoccupied barely holding back annoyance long enough to watch what Hessian’s writing. ‘I want to make you a job offering. Just as those you are accustomed to work.’

Salieri looks up. “You wanted to make a job offering, so you dragged me off to another world instead of just  _ asking _ ?”

‘In our defense, it’s rather difficult to make a job offering in the middle of a Hunt.’

“Have you  _ considered _ , then, simply  _ not kidnapping people off the street _ ?!”

Hessian doesn’t have a response to that. Salieri waits. When he’s certain nothing is forthcoming, he throws his hands up with an inarticulate, frustrated noise, that quickly becomes a strained whine and involuntarily doubling over when he smacks the back of his hand on the table on the gesture down. This seems fitting, Salieri thinks in between directing his irritation at the pain, for how his life is going.

When he looks up, both Rhyme and Hessian are peering at him in concern (or seeming to, for the latter). He’s caught frowning at them in disbelief, silent. Hessian’s half-standing, caught still with his hand extended towards Salieri’s shoulder. Rhyme breaks the pause with “Mister Salieri, are you alright?”

Salieri exhales and straightens back up. Hessian sits back sharply. “Yes,” Salieri tells Rhyme, tone measured, “I’m fine. Don’t worry.” He looks back to his original conversational partner, forcing some of the anger from his posture. “ _ What _ , then, is the job so important it requires picking up strangers without warning?” Still tense, but not as bad.

Hessian gestures at the violin case still lying on the bed. ‘We need a musician.’

Salieri pauses. The words printed take a while to process. The idea that  _ he’s _ being called a musician takes a while, too. Hessian waits, and what he gets in return is a sudden burst of bitter, angry laughter. “Then you shouldn’t have saved  _ me _ . Better off throwing me back into the furnace and teaching that dog of yours to play violin.” Salieri’s words hold more vicious bite than his angry outburst did. He watches the floor and forces his fingers into a fist tight enough to hurt, pulling on the burns. Another bitter laugh. The place he’s looking isn’t one that’s present. 

( _ “You couldn’t have done that. You stole his work, didn’t you?” / “What’s the use pretending, come on, tell us what you did! Everyone knows it was you.” / “The only way you would stand out is if the competition vanished, so…” _

Shut up.)

“You shouldn’t say things like that,” Rhyme says softly. She ducks into Salieri’s line of sight, meeting his eyes with her own worried ones. “You’re one of my friends, now, and I shouldn’t like to hear anyone say that one of my friends is better off hurt.”

Salieri shuts his eyes. Whatever she is, she’s also a kid, and seeing her with an expression like that manages to slip his feet out from under him. “Sorry,” offered not particularly sincerely, but at least quietly. He turns to face Hessian when he looks up. “I’m a talentless musician.” Salieri lets the words fall flat out of his mouth; airing them does nothing to make him feel better. It mostly makes him feel worse. “I lost my job as the choirmaster. I lost my students. Everyone decided I was talentless enough that my work must be plagiarized.  _ Clearly, _ I am not anyone with skill.” 

He pulls down on his fingers one by one with his thumb, stretching the joint until it hurts, because it’s easier to mind that then what he’s saying. Hessian watches his hand and resists the urge to stop him.

There’s a moment given before Hessian picks up the pen again. ‘But  _ can  _ you play?’ He’s not so stupid as to miss the implication of Salieri’s words.

He’s proven correct after a bit of Salieri fidgeting wordlessly. “Yes. Once I can move my fingers freely, I can play. Just… lower your expectations. And don’t ask me to compose.”

That should work. Hessian’s expectations were more or less non-existent anyways, and he should hardly know if composition is necessary. The requirements he’s aware of for a ritual host are only providing a musician with a living soul, and here one is. No one ever said anything about talent or composition (and he gets the feeling Salieri is the type to undersell himself, anyways).

The rest of the contract still must be voiced. Well, written. ‘No one is expected to work without equal return. You can have whatever time you need. If you play at one of the Hunt’s galas, you’ll be paid in a wish.’

Salieri furrows his brow, skeptical. He’s heard  _ stories _ before, thanks. “A wish? And how wrong are you going to make it go, hm?”

‘We’re lords of the Wild Hunt, not a monkey’s paw. Services rendered are services rewarded. If you play, what you ask once will be given.’

He looks at the words written before him, looping them in his thoughts. “If I…” He doesn’t want to believe it that easily, he wants to throw the whole thing out the window and walk out, but if there’s the possibility he can find what he needs to, he should take it. And it’s not like he has anything to go back to. It’s a wish. It shouldn’t have to be a literal object. Salieri swallows. “If I asked you to find a person who disappeared and bring them to me, would you be able to?”

Hessian bobs his shoulders in what functions as a nod before writing  _ ‘easily’ _ . It wouldn’t be a challenge for the Wild Hunt to, well, hunt someone. Even the dead or vanished.

Salieri’s answer is immediate. “Then I’ll play for you.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [nursery rhyme voice] i didn't understand the appeal of dumb violinists until hessian brought one home, and now i've pack bonded with him and if anything happens to him i'm going to cry
> 
> chapter title from bulgakov's master and margarita, of course... before margarita agrees to go to satan's ball. of course, this au really lacks an azazello, though behemoth and koroviev are accounted for (the latter has yet to show, and nursery rhyme is a well-behaved and modest behemoth).


End file.
